What to Know
- Plans to dump radioactive wastewater from a decommissioned nuclear plant into one of New York’s rivers this spring have been cancelled, the company in charge of the facility announced this week.
- The move follows strong pushback by state and local leaders in opposition to Holtec’s plans for the Indian Point Energy Center located approximately 35 miles north of New York City.
- As part of the decommissioning, the company reportedly planned to dump up to 1 million gallons of radioactive wastewater into the Hudson River starting in May.
NEW YORK — Plans to dump radioactive wastewater from a decommissioned nuclear plant into one of New York’s rivers this spring have been cancelled, the company in charge of the facility announced this week.
The move follows strong pushback by state and local leaders in opposition to Holtec’s plans for the Indian Point Energy Center located approximately 35 miles north of New York City.
As part of the decommissioning, the company reportedly planned to dump up to 1 million gallons of radioactive wastewater into the Hudson River starting in May.
“Following discussions with key state stakeholders, who wish to allow for additional public education, we have decided not to proceed with the planned discharge in early May,” company communications director Patrick O’Wrote wrote on Thursday. Brien, to the plant decommissioning board.
“While Holtec notes that the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has the ultimate authority over radiological fluid releases at Indian Point and other locations across the country, we hope this voluntary pause will be viewed positively as an indication of our willingness to work together with the State and with the surrounding community”.
The Westchester County facility is home to three nuclear power plants that operated from 1962 to 202. Holtec International acquired the facility from Entergy Corp. in May 2021 and said it planned to complete decommissioning efforts decades before Entergy would have continued ownership. .
At the time of the acquisition, reports indicated that the decommissioning of the nuclear site along the Hudson River would cost about $2.3 billion and would take at least 12 years.
Indian Point Unit 1 was permanently decommissioned in 1974. Unit 2 did not close until April 2020, while Unit 3 closed on April 30, 2021. The latter two, which came online with two years of Unlike the mid-1970s, they were once a major source of electricity in New York City and the lower Hudson Valley.
State legislators representing the region welcomed the decision to prevent discharges into the river.
“I am relieved that Holtec has wisely decided to withdraw from its attempt to speed up the schedule for its discharges into the Hudson River,” said Assemblywoman Dana Levenberg.
Despite the announcement, Levenberg planned to meet with other county officials Friday afternoon to ask for passage of a state bill that would prohibit “the discharge of any radiological agent into state waters.”
“The lack of transparency and inadequate communications with the public about this plan have been unacceptable, and the concerns of our constituents about the composition of the water cannot be ignored. I look forward to full and thorough responses from Holtec, the NRC and other regulators. to our questions about Holtec’s oversight of the IPEC rollback,” Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said in a statement.
